PAUL AND ANGELA had been going to Lake Gaston for years, visiting their lake home and taking their respite in the comfort of nature’s gaze. They wanted to build a larger home, so when the lot next door became available, they jumped at the chance to purchase the property.
Corbitt Hills happily took on the new build and recommended designer Rebecca Driggs for the interiors. The couple took the advice, hiring Driggs to bring their rustic luxury dreams to life in a gathering-focused lake home. “The homeowners wanted a Southern architectural style with a lot of outdoor living areas and gathering spaces,” says Driggs. “With that Southern style, I wanted to bring in a rustic, classic, and modern aesthetic. They wanted a lot of luxe and I wanted to bring livable.”
“Our vision was to have a place where family and friends could visit and feel as though they were in a resort,” adds Angela. With an Italian background, Angela brought a sense of warmth and large family gatherings to the design board. Driggs ran with it, adding touches of “Italy” here and there, like a cast-stone kitchen hood and fireplace, which became the jumping-off point. A well-equipped cooking and entertaining kitchen was important to Angela, while Paul got his own heavy-duty kitchen hidden behind the walls in a scullery-style space. “Paul lives by the motto Abundanza, which means abundance in Italian,” says Angela.
“He loves to cook, so I felt he deserved his own kitchen. With Rebecca’s help, we created one just for him.” “From there, we added reclaimed beams, handmade tile, warm paint colors, antique wood doors, lime-washed walls, and a mix of updated and antique furniture to create that classic, layered feel in the rest of the home,” explains Driggs.
The project took place over the course of two years, but in the end, Driggs and her team were able to spend a full week installing the design and getting the home lived-in ready by washing sheets and towels, making beds, and adding blankets and accessories to complete the look. “There was a lot of crying at the reveal, but at the end we had a full pizza party in the outdoor space, making use of the new pizza oven and living area that evening. It was so lovely,” recalls Driggs.
A home this size pleases everyone, with spaces each can call their own. “Paul’s room,” as he likes to call it, is a sunroom complete with a bourbon cabinet, an eighty-inch TV, a wood-burning fireplace, and a wine cooler with two comfortable lazy boys. Angela loves the home’s wide open spaces, like the family room with a wall of glass facing the lake. The wine cellar is her second favorite space—it’s cozy, made entirely of stone and brick in an Italianate cellar style, with a long, old, wood table and even a speakeasy window on one side that connects to the bar area of the family room.
Most weekends Angela and Paul host twelve to fourteen people, making pizzas in his authentic wood-fired pizza oven or serving fresh-caught fish and hush puppies. “Many Sundays we have guests who have caught what we call ‘lake-a-tosis’—they never want to leave,” laughs Angela. She adds that the most rewarding part of the past year in the home was being blessed with many wonderful and amazing memories with family and friends. “We recently had a family reunion, with a total of twenty-five adults and kids. We were together the entire weekend, and the house made it totally effortless. We are looking forward to many, many more memories to come.”